(Loose his beard and hoary hair

Streamed like a meteor to the troubled air ;)
And with a master's hand, and prophet's fire,
Struck the deep sorrows of his lyre.

'Hark how each giant-oak, and desert-cave, Sighs to the torrent's awful voice beneath! O'er thee, O King! their hundred arms they wave, Revenge on thee in hoarser murmurs breathe, Vocal no more, since Cambria's fatal day, To high-born Hoel's harp, or soft Llewellyn's lay.

'Cold is Cadwallo's tongue,

That hushed the stormy main :
Brave Urien sleeps upon his craggy bed:
Mountains, ye mourn in`vain

Modred,1 whose magic song

Made huge Plinlimmon bow his cloud-topt head. On dreary Arvon's shore they lie;

Smeared with gore, and ghastly pale;

Far, far aloof, the affrighted ravens sail;
The famished eagle screams and passes by.
Dear lost companions of my tuneful art,
Dear as the light that visits these sad eyes,
Dear as the ruddy drops that warm my heart,
Ye died amidst your dying country's cries—
No more I weep. They do not sleep,

On yonder cliffs, a griesly3 band,

I see them sit; they linger yet,

Avengers of their native land:

With me in dreadful harmony they join,

And weave with bloody hands the tissue of thy line.

'Weave the warp, and weave the woof,

The winding-sheet of Edward's1 race;

1 Hoel, Llewellyn, Cadwallo, Urien, Modred, Welsh Bards.
Arvon, the shores of Carnarvonshire, opposite Anglesea.
3 Griesly, grisly, terrible.
Edward, Edward II.

Give ample room, and verge enough,
The characters of hell to trace ;
Mark the year and mark the night,

When Severn shall re-echo with affright

The shrieks of death, through Berkeley's roof that ring, Shrieks of an agonising King!

She-wolf of France,' with unrelenting fangs That tear'st the bowels of thy mangled mate,

From thee be born, who o'er thy country hangs

The scourge of Heaven. What terrors round him wait!
Amazement in his van, with Flight combined,
And Sorrow's faded form, and Solitude behind.

'Mighty victor, mighty lord,

Low on his funeral couch he lies !

No pitying heart, no eye afford

A tear to grace his obsequies !

Is the sable warrior3 fled?

Thy son is gone. He rests among the dead.

The swarm, that in thy noon-tide beam were born?
-Gone to salute the rising Morn.

Fair laughs the Morn, and soft the zephyr blows,
While, proudly riding o'er the azure realm,

In gallant trim the gilded Vessel goes ;

Youth on the prow, and Pleasurea at the helm : Regardless of the sweeping Whirlwind's sway,

That, hushed in grim repose, expects his evening prey.

‘Fill high the sparkling bowl :

The rich repast prepare.

Reft of a crown, he yet may share the feast.—

Close by the regal chair,

Fell Thirst and Famine scowl

A baleful smile upon their baffled guest.

1 She-wolf of France, Isabel, Queen of Edward II.

* Scourge of Heaven, Edward III.

3 Sable warrior, the Black Prince.

+ Reign of Richard II.

Heard ye the din of battle bray,

Lance to lance, and horse to horse?

Long years of havoc1 urge their destined course,
And through the kindred squadrons mow their way,
Ye towers of Julius, London's lasting shame,
With many a foul and midnight murder fed,
Revere his Consort's faith, his Father's fame,
And spare the meek usurper's3 holy head.
Above, below, the rose of snow

Twined with her blushing foe we spread;
The bristled boar,' in infant gore,5

Wallows beneath the thorny shade.

Now, Brothers, bending o'er the accursed loom,
Stamp we our vengeance deep, and ratify his doom.

'Edward, lo! to sudden fate

(Weave we the woof. The thread is spun.)

Half of thy heart we consecrate.

(The web is wove.

The work is done.)—

Stay, O stay! nor thus forlorn

Leave me unblessed, unpitied here to mourn :
In yon bright track, that fires the western skies,
They melt, they vanish from my eyes.

But O! what solemn scenes on Snowdon's height
Descending slow their glittering skirts unroll!
Visions of glory! spare my aching sight!

Ye unborn ages, crowd not on my soul !
No more our long-lost Arthur' we bewail.
All hail, ye genuine Kings! Britannia's issue hail !

1 Long years of havoc, wars of York and Lancaster.

2 Towers of Julius. According to tradition, the Tower of London was built in part by Julius Cæsar. 3 Meek usurper, Henry VI.

✦ Bristled boar, badge of Richard III.

5 Infant gore, Edward V. and his brother.

Half of thy heart, Queen Elinor died soon after the conquest of Wales. 7 Arthur, Henry VII. named his eldest son Arthur, 'in deference to British feelings and legends.'

8 Genuine Kings, the Tudors.

'Girt with many a baron bold

Sublime their starry fronts they rear ; And gorgeous dames, and statesmen old In bearded majesty appear.

In the midst a form divine1!

Her eye proclaims her of the Briton-Line;
Her lion-port, her awe-commanding face,
Attempered sweet to virgin grace.

What strings symphonious tremble in the air!
What strains of vocal transport round her play!
Hear from the grave, great Taliessin, hear;
They breathe a soul to animate thy clay.

Bright Rapture calls, and soaring, as she sings,
Waves in the eye of Heaven her many-coloured wings.

'The verse adorn again

Fierce War and faithful Love,

And Truth severe, by fairy Fiction drest :

In buskined measures move,

Pale Grief, and pleasing Pain,

With Horror, tyrant of the throbbing breast.2

A voice, as of the cherub-choir,

Gales from blooming Eden bear,3

3

And distant warblings lessen on my ear,

That lost in long futurity expire.

Fond, impious man, think'st thou, yon sanguine cloud Raised by thy breath, has quenched the orb of day?

To-morrow he repairs the golden flood,

And warms the nations with redoubled ray,

Enough for me with joy I see

The different doom our fates assign.

Be thine Despair, and sceptred Care :

To triumph and to die, are mine.'

He spoke, and headlong from the mountain's height, Deep in the roaring tide he plunged to endless night.

1 A form divine, Queen Elizabeth.
2 Poetry of Shakespeare.

T. Gray.

3 Poetry of Milton.

King.

CCXLIX.

KING HENRY IV. SECOND PART.

ACT III. SCENE I.-Westminster. The Palace.

Enter the KING.

OW many thousand of my poorest subjects
Are at this hour asleep! O sleep, O

gentle sleep,

Nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee,
That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down

And steep my senses in forgetfulness?

Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs,

Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee

And hushed with buzzing night-flies to thy slumber,
Than in the perfumed chambers of the great,

Under the canopies of costly state,

And lulled with sound of sweetest melody?

O thou dull god, why liest thou with the vile
In loathsome beds, and leavest the kingly couch
A watch-case or a common 'larum-bell?

Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast
Seal up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains
In cradle of the rude imperious surge,

And in the visitation of the winds,

Who take the ruffian billows by the top,

Curling their monstrous heads and hanging them
With deafening clamour in the slippery clouds,
That, with the hurly, death itself awakes?
Canst thou, O partial sleep, give thy repose
To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude,
And in the calmest and most stillest night,
With all appliances and means to boot,
Deny it to a king? Then happy low, lie down!
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.
W. Shakespeare.